BIRDS OF PARADISE. 



417 



under one foot, pulls it to pieces and eats it by piecemeal. Worms are wholly rejected, 

 but flesh, raw or dressed, and bread he eats greedily, and sometimes barley, with the 

 pheasants and other granivorous birds occasionally turned into the garden, and never 

 refuses hempseed. He seldom attempts to hide the remainder of a meaL 



With a very considerable share of attachment, he is naturally pugnacious, and the 

 hand that the moment before had tendered Mm food and caresses will repent an attempt 

 to take him up. To children he 

 has an utter aversion, and will 

 scarcely suffer them to enter the 

 garden. Even strangers of any 

 age are challenged with impunity ; 

 he approaches all with daring im 

 pudence, and so completely does 

 the sight of strangers change his 

 affection for the time, that even 

 his favourites and best bene- 

 factors cannot touch him with 

 impunity in these moments of 

 evident displeasure." 



As is the case with nearly all 

 coast birds, the Chough builds its 

 nest at no great distance from the 

 sea, generally choosing some con 

 venient crevice in a cliff, or an 

 old ruin near the sea-shore. The 

 nest is always placed at a consi- 

 derable elevation from the ground, 

 and is made of sticks lined with 

 wool, hair, and other soft sub- 

 stances. The eggs are usually 

 five in number, and in colour 

 they are yellower than those of 

 the crow or rook, but are spotted 

 with similar tints. The general 

 colour of the Chough is black, 

 with a rich blue gloss, contrasting 

 well with the vermilion-red of the 

 beak, legs, and toes. The claws 

 are black, and the eyes are curi- 

 ously coloured with red and blue 

 in concentric circles. The total 

 length of the adult male Chough 

 is about seventeen inches, and 

 the female is about three inches 

 shorter. 



CHOUGH. Coracia gracula. ^ 



THE supremely glorious mem- 

 bers of the feathered tribe which 

 have by common consent been 



termed BIEDS OF PAEADISE are not very numerous in species, but are so different in 

 form and colour, according to the sex and age, that they have been considered far 

 more numerous than is really the case. The plumage of these birds is wonderfully rich 

 and varied, and not even the humming-birds themselves present such an inexhaustible 

 treasury of form and colour as is found among the comparatively few species of the Birds 

 of Paradise. In all, the feathers glow with resplendent radiance, in nearly all there is 

 some strange and altogether unique arrangement of the plumage, and in many the feathers 

 2. 2 E 



